How to get into your customer’s knickers

You know how “words of the day” are. Someone uses them, they sound cool and before you know everyone adopts them. It goes from one to the other. Like some secret in a circle game. Before you know it, no one knows what it means.

The term interlock is like that. Interlock groups in training organizations placed a catchy label on a good concept, but something got lost in translation. Recently, a senior executive asked me what the interlock group in his company’s training department does and does he really need all of those people.

I believe, though I am not sure, since I am not in the inner circle, that the role of such groups is to create a link between business units and training departments; to live with these functional groups so that they truly feel their pain and translate it into training requirements. They act as an ombudsman between business groups and the training department. As I understand it, interlock groups get into the knickers of their customers.

Knowing that my friend has never been able to figure out what his training department does in the first place, I answered that if you have to ask that question, they probably aren’t doing their job well and you may be better off without them.

Having been in the training and performance improvement world long enough, I have noticed that the pendulum swings between creating a centralized training department to optimize resources and reduce expenses and creating business units training groups to increase their alignment and responsiveness. When times and good and money is flush, companies go for smaller, more aligned, and more responsive. When money is tight, they more to the centralized model.

Neither model is perfect. One tends to not be as aligned and the other creates some duplication and waste. Centralized training departments create interlock groups in an effort to get the best of both worlds.

In my friend’s case, it didn’t work. Pick your poison.

Which training model do you feel works best and why? Have you worked with interlock groups? What has been your experience? Are you a member of an interlock group? What have you done to make it work well?

I look forward to hearing from you,

Where’s the Beef?

It is really hard to find a technician who doesn’t simply change parts, but knows how things work. A friend of mind who ran a training department for appliance mechanics called this “washerness.”

I so rarely find this that I would like to share it when I do.

A few weeks ago, my 15 year old oven stopped working. Any sane individual would have simply replaced the darn thing, though not I. After my initial investigation, it became apparent that I was looking at spending at least a grand and probably two. That’s more than a heavy duty laptop and I just won’t do it.

I called around town to find someone who would look at the oven. Everyone I called would charge at least a hundred and fifty dollar to take a look at the unit and the cost when up from there. That was ridiculous.

Out of sheer luck, I ran across Bob Colson, who answered the telephone immediately. No receptionist or voicemail for him. After taking with him for a few minutes, it was obvious that he was the real deal. He said that he would be there the next day.

Bob showed up with a helper. It could have been his son. They acted the same way. No pleasantries for these two. They went into the kitchen and immediately began taking apart the oven. Before I knew it, they were reading the wiring schematic and were pulling wires and testing connections. I tried to ask them how it was going, but they acted as if I was not in the room. It was them and the oven and the oven was not talking.

I went back into my home office and continued my work. Before I knew it, Bob had announced that he was finished and began packing up his tools. He presented me with a bill for about $60 and was ready to go on to the next call. As he was walking out the door, I asked him what was wrong. He said that is was a broken wire in the circuit box outside. I could have spent thousands on a new oven and it would still have not broiled chicken.

Thank goodness for people like Bob. No brag, just fact: pure beef, no lettuce, tomatoes, and no bun. Plain and simple, they just do a good job.

Bob thanks for being there when I needed you.

Have any of you met someone like Bob? Please tell us.